Roko Koloma

In a statement released this afternoon, Kiele said this despite the recent national court decision to dismiss an appeal sought by the incumbent national statistician, Roko Koloma to stay his warrant of arrest by police.

Kiele said the allegations levelled against Koloma is between him and the police as the law enforcement agency.

He said that the NSO remains neutral but will assist police in its investigations if and when required.

Koloma is facing arrest by police on official corruption allegations.

He has been wanted by police for questioning since February over discrepancies of more than K24 million in the NSO accounts after the Department of Finance conducted an audit investigation in 2017.

Police obtained a warrant for his arrest on April 13, however it has not been effected on Koloma, after he obtained interim stay from the Waigani District Court and National courts respectively.

The refusal of the motions now leaves members of the Royal PNG Constabulary in the clear to effect the arrest warrant they obtained from the Waigani District Court on April 13 on Koloma.

His lawyer on April 4 and 30 obtained an interim stay against his arrest pending the hearing of these motions.

Magistrate Cosmas Bidar this morning gave his ruling on three motions, dismissing them.

Motions in Koloma’s case adjourned

http://www.looppng.com/node/76780

A number of motions filed before the Waigani District Court in relation to a case involving National Statistician Roko Koloma will return to court next month.

Opposition calls for tax explanation

http://www.looppng.com/node/76781

These include court orders issued last month to stay a warrant of arrest obtained against Koloma by police on allegations of official corruption.

His lawyer returned before Magistrate Cosmas Bidar today, where the motions were adjourned to May 29 on consent by parties.

The motions, which also include a contempt motion filed by Koloma, will be heard in court then.

A warrant of arrest was obtained by police for Koloma on April 13. He then took out a stay on his arrest on April 30.

This means during this period, the government had no reliable statistics for Gross Domestic Product to measure the country’s economic performance and book-keeping for national accounts.

However, this gap is slowly being bridged under the National Statistical Office (NSO) Reform 2014-2019.

As per NEC’s decision 162 of 2014, NSO for the last 4 years has been under strict reformation to improve processes and statistics as well as building long-term capability to ensure the future of NSO.

The major achievement so far is the production of outstanding GDP reports.

While manual survey is the tried and true method of collecting data, technology and digital means are rapidly taking over.

Technologies such as biometrics, remote sensors and barcoding all boil down to data revolution and NSO is working towards tapping into this.

“In NSO, in our legislation, we need to insert something to talk about transfer of data from business to us. We are doing it but not effectively and consistently,” emphasized national statistician, Roko Koloma.

Roko Koloma is being investigated by the Royal PNG Constabulary Fraud Squad.

TIPNG has made this call after media reports that Koloma is being sought by the police in regards to a discrepancy of more than K24 million in the NSO accounts after the Department of Finance conducted an audit investigation in 2017.

Koloma noted an average annual growth of 9.4 percent.

This means there were a lot of economic activities, increased jobs and a thriving economy.

GDP is the total value of everything produced by all the people and companies in the country.

Gross domestic product is the best way to measure a country's economy.

The level of GDP increased from K25.4 billion in 2006 to K47.5 billion in 2013, revealed Koloma.

The increase was mainly driven by agriculture, forestry and fishing while wholesale and retail trade industries reliably aided this growth as well.

Transparency International PNG’s (TIPNG) statement follows the unsuccessful attempt by police to take Koloma in for questioning last Friday.